The #1 Success Factor in Real Estate Sales… Building a Winning Mindset

90% of sales success can be attributed to the strength of your mindset and your attitude. All you have to do is Google the words Success and Mindset and you’ll find all sorts of proof to confirm this fact. Real estate sales success is certainly dependent upon the strength of your mindset.

The stronger your mindset, the stronger your mental toughness – this then contributes significantly to your ability to deal with the peaks and valleys of selling homes, selling vacant land, working with home buyers, and working with real estate investors. Here’s a snapshot of a recent real-life experience where mental toughness played a huge part in the success of the outcome…

On January 15, 2009 US Airways flight #1549 was heading to Charlotte North Carolina from New York City’s LaGuardia Airport. With 155 passengers on board it took off as planned but 90 seconds after takeoff at 3000 feet the plane went through a flock of geese that pounded the windshield and knocked out both engines.

In an instant, the plane was powerless… it was now on full glide in one of the most highly populated cities in the world. Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger said that he knew the situation was bad immediately – losing both engines over a NYC…what could be worse? Sully said he soon felt “an adrenaline rush right to my core”. But as his heart rate increased, he forced himself to ignore the physical symptoms… “I had a job to do” he said.

Sullenberger, 58 years old at the time realized that he had a split-second choice to make… he couldn’t get back to LaGuardia with no engines, he couldn’t crash the plane in one of the world’s largest cities… his only option was to attempt a landing on the Hudson River in the middle of winter! The rest is history…

After clearing the George Washington Bridge by a mere 900 feet Sullenberger guided his powerless Airbus A320 plane along the river. As the plane descended, he realized that “The water was coming up fast, faster than the runway for a normal landing”. He told the flight attendants, “Brace for impact” – this is airline code that a crash landing is imminent. No modern airliner has ever ditched in water without fatalities. This was an amazing exception… the plane glided smoothly along the surface of the river and came to a halt. Zero fatalities! Essentially no injuries at all! It is since been called the “Miracle on the Hudson”.

Sullenburger stayed cool throughout the whole process including having his crew and flight attendants usher all passengers out onto the wings of the plane where they were picked up by rescuers in the New York Harbor. Everyone was safe. One passenger recalled seeing the pilot in a life raft as calm and unruffled as could be. “He was so in control, I thought he was a rescuer”.

When asked how he was able to make all this happen, to stay calm and make the right decisions under incredible pressure… Capt. Sullenberger said with a smile on his face, “Well I must admit, it wasn’t as bad as I thought… I think something remarkable did happen that day”. The experts unanimously agreed that Sully was selling his achievement short… short by a long shot. In hindsight, what Sully demonstrated was incredible presence of mind, great mental toughness and a Winning MINDSET that said…”do what has to be done, do it well, and don’t make a big deal of it.”

This is the kind of mindset everyone can develop… it is a learned skill. Hopefully, you’re never going to be challenged the same way as Capt. Sullenburger was – but regardless, everyone’s life is full of ups and downs. The business of real estate sales is incredibly taxing at times… what I’m going to share with you today is a collection of the best ideas to help you strengthen your mindset… to develop that WINNING MINDSET that sets you above the majority of the population and will make you successful not only in business but in your personal life…

There are three main results you should expect from this overview…

Result #1. You’ll be a lot tougher… I’m going to show you how to build up your immunity to rejection, negativity and doubt.

Result #2. You be well equipped for the ride… you’re going to get a crash course on how to create that WINNING MINDSET that will make such a huge difference as you go about dealing with the peaks and valleys that are part of everyday real estate sales, business, and life.

Result #3. You’ll be more confident than ever… you are capable of far more than you can imagine & by the time we’re done, you’re going to believe it!

There are 4 parts to the ideas and techniques I’m going to leave you with:

1. Your Day
2. Things To Do
3. Who You Are Being
4. How You Think

For this first Blog we will deal with WINNING MINDSET techniques related to Your Day. Subsequent Blogs are soon to follow. They will address items #2, 3, and 4 from the above list…

Part #1… YOUR DAY

“Our words reveal our thoughts, our manners mirror our self-esteem, our actions reflect our character, and our habits predict the future”

Inspirational Writer William Arthur Ward

1. Start with Your Routine

Your routine puts you in charge and gives you control. It is critical that you have a strong routine in place as one of the foundations for building that WINNING MINDSET. Why? Listen to what mindset expert Brian Tracy says about the connection between self-confidence and control…

“Your level of self-confidence is directly proportional to the degree with which you feel in control of your life at any particular moment”

With that in mind, it’s safe to conclude that the more control you feel, the more control you have…the higher the level of your self-confidence.

And his amazing bestseller, “The Power of Habits”, author Charles Duhigg puts it very simply in a cause-and-effect approach. Duhigg says, “Create predictability in your day and you will create predictability in your mind”. That’s how you create a WINNING MINDSET. He goes on to say that the way you build up that predictability is to start by developing a rocksolid routine. Here’s some of the components of a rocksolid routine. There’s no magic here, keep it simple…

Go to bed on time, get up early, eat good food, exercise, perform the activities you must do on a daily basis over and over and over. For example, professional athletes use a very solid routine for 95% of their game. Look at a golfer’s backswing or a tennis player’s serve. Always the same, over and over and over. Just watch golfer Rory McIlroy or tennis star Raphael Nadal and you’ll see what I mean. They do the same thing each time. It never varies. Make no mistake, this may be boring at times but it is the recipe for success in performing at the highest level.

The key is to understand that whatever your profession, including real estate sales, some things are going to be repetitious and perhaps even boring. It’s from that repetition that the excellence is born. Your success will come from making sure that most of what happens is predictable… most but not everything. That way your results will be predictable in a good way. It doesn’t mean you have to eliminate all the spontaneity from your life. I’ll explain more when we get to point #2 below.

Conclusion: this first point is a very black-and-white item… either you are in control of your day-to-day existence or others are in control of what goes on in your real estate sales career. You have to make the decision and be strong enough to stick with it. For example there are two critical things that you must avoid at all costs in your routine… no interruptions and no multitasking. That’s another whole topic but just be clear on the dangers of getting wrapped up in everyone else’s agenda and ignoring your own. All the points we’re going to cover in this material lead you back to being in control and following a powerful routine.

2. Schedule Time Off

In their now famous publication “Mental Toughness Training” Dr. James Loehr and Peter McLaughlin tell the story of working with several young tennis “phenoms” at the legendary Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Bradenton, Florida. One story focused around a young 19-year-old who was tremendously driven to succeed and worked out tirelessly every day. Clearly he showed great promise.

One day everything went wrong… he literally could not get out of bed. He was exhausted physically and mentally. This young superstar had been overdoing it. In spite of his youth, he was no longer able to function even closely to the level at which he had been performing. It took close to 90 days to get him back on track. As Loehr and McLaughlin reported… “If you do not give your body and your mind a rest on a regular basis, it will do it for you. You must not only take time to refresh yourself physically, it’s even more important that you plan time off to refresh yourself mentally”.

Conclusion: to build up your mental toughness, it is critical that you take some time off. Make sure you plan specific dates plus build in some spontaneity that will make your life exciting and interesting. This way you have the best of both… a solid routine and planned “refresh time”. 

3. Write out your Personal Goals Daily

“When the why is strong the how becomes easy” Jim Rohn

It’s important that you be very clear as to why you are doing what you are doing. I have been doing this for years, filling up book after book of journal entries. Guaranteed this will change your focus and your ultimate success – the same as it has for me. There are two parts to this exercise:

1. i) Take a few minutes and write down 2 personal goals for the following three categories…my health, my family, my finances. What would you do to fulfill your life as you reap more and more successes?
2. ii) keep them front and center… never lose sight of this motivation. It’s more powerful to write them out than it is to read them every day. Either way, make sure you look at them every 24 hours so you never forget what all your hard work is aimed at.

Conclusion: staying motivated is an ongoing activity. When things are going well, it’s easy to be motivated. When you lose a real estate listing to a competitor or when a home buyer backs out at the last moment, you need to be crystal clear on the big picture. Studies have shown that only 3% of the population have written personal goals. The other 97% say, “I know what they are, they’re in my head”. Be one of the 3%.

4. Use Powerful Self Talk

In conjunction with writing out your personal goals, make sure you are affirming verbally who you want to be, what you want to accomplish, and why it’s important to you. This takes the form of affirmations repeated out loud. Repeat a minimum of 5 affirmations daily. Here’s some examples from my list:

I am my word and I set a great example every day.

I’m excited about today! I love my work.

My business is thriving, I help people every day.

I manage my money wisely. I am financially secure.

I love myself enough to look after my health every day.

My clients love me and they send me business every day.

I am very healthy and my energy level is amazing!

I am already there!

Conclusion: just so you know, everyone already uses affirmations every day, sometimes unknowingly. I often hear a real estate salesperson say to me in my Real Estate Sales Coaching business that, “I don’t believe in affirmations. That’s not me”. I don’t hesitate to point out to them that they just used an affirmation. We do it all the time. Considering this reality, you may as well create some positive affirmations that support who you are, and where you want to be.

Here’s a great book to take you even further into this point …“What to Say When You Talk to Yourself” Shad Helmsteder)

5. Track Your Numbers

If you don’t know where you are, how can you ever get to where you want to go? It is crucial to track your results every week. Things like the critical five items… listing appointments, listings taken, listings sold, buyer sales, closings.

Here’s a great approach to get you started. Set up a whiteboard with 3 simple columns for the month: listings to be taken, listings to be sold, buyers to be sold. Use a simple reverse thermometer so you know where you are at any point throughout the month. For example: if you wanted to take 4 listings in a given month, this column would show the numbers 4, 3, 2, 1, 0 in descending order. Every time you take a new listing, cross off the current number. This will tell you “how many house listings taken to go before month end”. Do the same for listings sold and buyer sales.

Conclusion: This approach will strengthen your mindset as you see yourself move closer and closer to your goal for that 30 day period. Those real estate agents that don’t track their numbers are typically avoiding looking at the truth. You need to know where you stand at all times for one of two reasons… so you can feel good about how you’re doing or… so you can make adjustments to get back on track. Either way this is a critical part of being a real estate sales professional.